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By Courtney SherwoodReuters • Saturday August 9, 2014 6:32 AM

PORTLAND, Ore. — A fast-spreading wildfire threatened 740 dwellings in northern Oregon yesterday
after destroying a home and five other buildings overnight in what officials said could be one of
the state’s worst blazes in years.

About 600 households already have been evacuated from the path of the Rowena Fire, which has
almost doubled in size since Thursday and has burned about 3,400 acres in the scenic Columbia River
Gorge.

An additional 140 households have been put on standby to leave.

Experts say extreme drought in California and unusually dry conditions across Idaho and the
Pacific Northwest have exacerbated the annual West Coast fire season, which runs from mid-May to
mid-October.

In Oregon alone, about 4,600 firefighters are battling a dozen blazes across more than 105,000
acres.

“This is shaping up to be one of the more active fire seasons we think we will see in decades,”
said Alisa Cour, a spokeswoman for crews fighting the Rowena Fire.

In neighboring Washington state, some progress was reported tackling a lightning-sparked blaze.
That wildfire was 15 percent contained yesterday, said Cory Wall, a spokesman for the Washington
Incident Management Team.

Eight homes and 10 other buildings have been destroyed, and evacuation orders remain in effect
for about 250 homes, he said.

A separate series of four wildfires raging unchecked on the Collville Indian Reservation in
northeastern Washington had grown to about 8,300 acres. The Devil’s Elbow Complex fires were
threatening 100 structures, officials said.

In Oregon, Gov. John Kithaber visited with firefighting crews and said the Rowena blaze could be
one of the state’s worst conflagrations in recent memory.

Cour said fire crews were gaining ground in several areas, and that the blaze was 35 percent
contained, up from zero percent on Thursday.

The Rowena Fire has cost $1 million to fight since it was sparked on a brushy hillside on
Tuesday night, according to estimates submitted to the National Wildfire Coordinating Group.

In central Oregon, high winds caused the South Fork Complex of fires to grow 25 percent in the
past day, fire crews said yesterday morning.

Several other major fires, including one that had threatened a major power-transmission line
between Oregon and Idaho, were being gradually contained.